Cloud computing has played a major role in reshaping how companies conduct business. Several organizations are in the process of migrating to the cloud to achieve scalability, cost-efficiency and enhanced application performance. With increased embracement of cloud computing, let’s take a look at some of the key trends taking shape in 2017.
Containerization
The cloud computing industry has seen tremendous growth in the use of containers, which enable developers to package monolithic applications into small bits of code in an isolated environment. Several organizations are leveraging containers to allow portability between cloud services, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud. In addition, orchestrators like Kubernetes have become a popular way to manage container networking, security and storage.
Hybridization
Migrating to the cloud is an arduous undertaking that doesn’t happen overnight. Consequently, some organizations are in a hybrid world consisting of both on-premises and cloud environments. This approach enables companies to take advantage of cloud computing scalability without the risk of disclosing sensitive data to third-party vulnerabilities. A hybrid environment isn’t without its drawbacks, however. In a hybrid environment, data is fragmented across local servers and cloud services. In addition, users are limited to on-premise deployment or cloud-only use. A dearth of management tools and common application program interfaces (APIs) is also an issue for public cloud providers.
Colocation
Demand for colocation services continues to grow in the U.S. According to a recent survey by Vertiv consisting of 226 U.S. enterprise data center managers, 47% of respondents said they use more than one kind of data center in their daily operations. While many CIOs wish to quit managing their own data centers, they are uncertain about which cloud bandwagon to embrace, resorting to colocation services from Equinix and Digital Realty in return. The survey found 57% of respondents expect to increase their usage of colocation and cloud hosting data centers in the next two years.
Cost management optimization
Optimizing cloud costs is a main goal for cloud users. It is commonly thought that CIOs can save money by investing in public cloud software; however, many CIOs embracing multiple cloud providers find themselves drowning in cloud vendor management. AWS, Microsoft and Google are making it more challenging with a host of cloud services and consumption plans. For AWS compute resources, for instance, users are charged on an hourly basis from the time they launch a resource until the time it is terminated. IT executives are getting better at containing cloud costs throughout 2017 as their practices continue to develop. In addition, CIOs are gaining a better grasp of SaaS, PaaS and IaaS, which is helping them make financially informed purchases. Cost management tools from Cloudability, Cloud Cruiser and Cloudyn are also available now.
Machine learning and artificial intelligence
Machine learning and artificial intelligence are gaining footing in the cloud as well. Tech giants like Google, Microsoft, AWS and IBM have all introduced machine-learning and artificial-intelligence-based cloud services. Amazon, for example, became the first public cloud provider to mix artificial intelligence with the cloud to better secure customer data with its Amazon Macie services. Microsoft currently offers more than 20 cognitive services too.
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